Government Technology Featured Article

Public stock company Consip S.p.A. has just announced its framework agreement for contact center services of public administrations. The company, owned by Italy’s Ministry of the Economic and Finance (MEF (News - Alert)), is offering this agreement to contenders from several economic operators in the country, but the agreement has not officially been made with any one specific operator yet.

The idea is that Consip S.p.A. and the operators involved will benefit the Italian government by helping it to better connect directly with citizens, employees and other residents of the country that use its various communication channels.

Channels that will be targeted in the project include both inbound and outbound, and will facilitate getting important information and services to the people in a more efficient and effective manner.

This new initiative is focusing largely on contact center outsourcing as well, in order to strengthen the solutions in which both the technological infrastructure and its personnel are delegated to the service provider.

The annual cost of this practice is currently $148.8 million, but Consip S.p.A. is looking to lower this number significantly now that the agreement has been announced. Currently the “race” for Consip’s contract will be carried out through the company’s electronic platform, and the “Framework Agreement of 24 months” will be awarded to whichever contender proves the most economically advantageous.

The agreement is valued at a starting price of $121.8 million.

The deadline for submitting to the pseudo-contest is March 21, 2013, and the “bidding,” in a sense, will reportedly go on for about 16 hours.

Once everything has been settled and agreed upon, the Italian government will then carry out specific contracts based on the conditions laid out in the official agreement.

Requests for more information must be submitted before 12 p.m. on March 1, 2013.